Posts By: Emily Fromm

Every time we give a grant to a shelter or rescue group, we ask for a report detailing how they used the funds and telling us the story of an individual pet helped as a result. (You can read all of these reports here.)

There are always some that make us smile, or laugh, or say, “wow!” And I wanted to share those with you. So here you’ll find our favorites from 2017, all featuring pets helped by your donations.

Sundance: Best Humane Educator
Brother Wolf Animal Rescue in North Carolina got a grant from us to support its humane-education program, and Sundance, a boxer mix who’d been waiting for a home for nine long months, was the perfect canine ambassador. Over four weeks, he taught more than 100 elementary-school students how to properly interact with pets. He became a social-media star and soon found a forever home where he’s the center of attention.

Hemi: Craziest Rescue Story
In June, the 2-month-old kitten was seen dodging cars on a busy North Carolina highway. Construction workers stopped traffic to try to catch him, but he vanished. Unbelievably, he’d managed to jump into a car’s undercarriage, and hitchhiked all the way back to the driver’s home, where he hid in the garage, still avoiding capture for several days before finally getting caught on some sticky pads for bugs. In a stroke of luck, the homeowner’s neighbor was a volunteer for Paws for Life NC, and she got Hemi, who had a badly broken leg, the care he needed, with help from our Emergency Medical Grant. These days, Hemi is healthy, safe, and adored by his forever family.

Roxanne and Lando: Best Bonded Seniors
Senior dogs are hard to find homes for — two XL seniors, even moreso. But when these two gentle, bonded boxers were surrendered to a shelter due to a breakup in the only home they’d ever known, Rescue One in Missouri had to save them. A Petfinder visitor’s Sponsor a Pet donation allowed the group to waive their adoption fee, and after six months in foster care, these two “big babies” went to a loving home — together.

Crystal: Best Reunion
Our Disaster Grant helped Sonoma Humane Society care for pets displaced by Northern California wildfires — including Crystal, who jumped out of her carrier and took off running while her family was evacuating. Luckily, she was eventually caught and brought to the shelter, where, thanks to her microchip, staffers were able to contact Crystal’s owner. As it was safe to return home, the owner came straight in to pick up her cherished 12-year-old cat.

Franklin: Best Playgroup Makeover
We LOVE helping shelters implement playgroup programs! They truly save lives, and Franklin, helped by our grant to Ohio’s Cuyahoga County Animal Shelter, is a perfect example. He arrived with lots of bad behaviors, was labeled dog-aggressive and was nearly impossible for staff to handle. Once they put him in playgroups, he became a different dog! He turned out to be dog-friendly, and his stress-induced behaviors vanished. These days, he’s doing wonderfully in a home with a canine sibling!

Billie: Funniest Office Cat
Our grant to Metro East Humane Society in Illinois helped 14-month-old Billie get needed eye surgery. She still has only partial vision, but that doesn’t stop the mischievous kitten from bringing daily smiles to shelter staff as she awaits her forever home — and helps herself to her favorite treats, even if they’re supposed to be “for dogs”!

Autumn: Bravest Chicken
Autumn was badly burned in the Northern California wildfires, and is being rehabilitated at Sonoma Humane Society. But she’s helping others heal at the same time, as part of the shelter’s therapeutic humane-education program, supported by our grant. The program teaches children empathy and compassion and, since the fires, has also provided a calming environment to kids who lost their homes. “The children are learning a lot from Autumn,” program director Carol Rathmann tells us, “but their most important lesson is that every living being deserves a chance.”

“We are currently experiencing an unprecedented wild fire disaster,” says Development Director Melissa Dobar. “Many have had to evacuate quickly and were not able to take their animals. Over 2,000 residences have been destroyed. Since this began on Oct. 8, 2017, we have had hundreds of calls and animals come through our doors. The disaster continues with winds moving fires throughout the community.

“We are providing services with a skeleton crew, as many of our own staff have lost homes and are evacuated and some are living at the shelter. We are taking in burned and injured animals and providing shelter and medical care; facilitating a lost-and-found-pets effort; providing resources and items to evacuees; and working closely with our municipal shelter, Sonoma County Animal Services (SCAS), and the California Veterinary Medical Association to make our medical and surgery suites available for animals impacted by the fires.

“As the fires began, the SCAS shelter lost power, phones and Internet and, until they recovered, we were set up to provide communications and assistance on their behalf. We are also in communication with partner shelters and rescues throughout the area. Our primary partnership is with SCAS, as they lead the Emergency Operations for the animals in our area.”

Like the rest of the island, the Guaynabo-based shelter serving the greater San Juan area was severely damaged by Hurricane Maria. “We lost a component to our power generator, components for our surgical table, our refrigerator to store vaccinations, and our van has died,” says Executive Director Maritza Rodriguez. “We sustained significant water damage. We need help making these repairs so we can become fully functional again and reopen our medical clinic, which provides low-cost services to thousands of animals every year. We imagine that many animals have been injured by Maria and, in the long term, we want to be able to offer them care — from basic vaccinations and testing, to surgeries for broken bones, and sterilizations.

“This will be an ongoing project, as we imagine the fallout from Maria will go on for months and months, if not years. We believe our generator repairs would be about $2,000, our surgical table about $500, a new refrigerator $1,500, and a new (second-hand) van $5000. We would put the rest of the grant money into animal medical services to allow us to reduce our prices even more for animals affected by Maria. After Irma hit, we saw a very high incidence of animals that had been run over by vehicles, and we imagine the same will be true here. We would like to be able to help them, and also provide DHLPP [distemper, hepatitis, leptospirosis, parainfluenza and parvovirus], rabies, and bordetella vaccinations, as well as fecal tests and treatment, and spay/neuter services.

“Given the severity of the situation on the ground in Puerto Rico, it is very hard to know when supplies will once again reach the island. Ideally, we would like to fix our generator and surgical table immediately. But communications are very compromised and transportation is difficult. There is also a gas shortage. We would like to purchase a new refrigerator ASAP so we can store vaccines, but most of the stores are closed now. We hope to be able to make these repairs and purchases in the next couple of weeks; same with the van. As for providing care to the animals, we would keep this going as long as we have funding.”

“Our shelter is still picking up the pieces left behind by Hurricane Irma,” Senior Director of Development Ronald Stayton says. “We estimate that we suffered more than $400,000 in losses and costs associated with downtime. When we first lost power, the chiller could not handle the load and we lost air conditioning in all but one area of the shelter, and our A/C compressors blew. We had to move all animals from affected parts of the shelter and from our separate intake/quarantine building into the main shelter where the A/C was working. As a result of moving sick animals to the main building, we are currently experiencing a spread of the illnesses that were in that building, primarily upper-respiratory infection. We anticipated this and had ordered medications as a precautionary measure.”

The adoption center, which is home to 180 cats and 139 dogs, also had several leaks in its roof from the severe beating it got from the storm, and the community spay/neuter clinic also experienced roof damage and has several leaks.

Sherry Mansfield, executive director of the Middleburg, FL, shelter, says: “We were badly flooded during Hurricane Irma and have to replace the infrastructure, including all equipment, appliances, drywall, furniture, air conditioning and ductwork, etc. We still have more than 40 cats and kittens and six dogs. We have received many donations from the community but right now we need funding to help get the shelter operational. We have much to do inside the building.”

“Hurricane Irma destroyed two structures we highly depend on,” says Valerie Bliss, director of development at the Bradenton shelter. “One of the structures is a storage shed for all of our lawn-maintenance equipment. Sadly, first the shed was robbed the day after the hurricane, and then a very large tree branch came down and crushed it. Irma also destroyed a shed where we kept clean towels, beds and sheets for our shelter animals. Cleanliness and comfort are top priorities for the care of our shelter residents. Our shelter is at capacity, so storage is virtually nonexistent. Temporarily, volunteers are taking loads of laundry home to clean for us. The downside to this is the fact that we are dependent on them to return the clean laundry as soon as possible, coupled with the fact that our industrial machines are set up for the highest sanitary standards as set by hospitals.” Grant funds will go toward replacing the sheds.

“While we did not get a direct hit by Hurricane Irma, we did suffer severe damages and losses by the rain and heavy winds that came with her,” says Debra Beye Barwick, director of the Fort Lauderdale rescue. “We are asking for your help in funding for a new water pump and a new 40′ dry cargo container, as ours were damaged. We also lost four 18′ x 21′ shelters that were in our turn-out areas and in the pasture. Our long term needs: to get the fallen trees off our fences, to replace the fences with corral panels, and to bring 25 loads of clean white fill to help with the footing for the horses and their caretakers.”

“Before, during, and after Hurricane Irma, our staff has worked literally day and night with hurricane preparedness, evacuating cats from other organizations to us, caring for all the cats during the storm, and cleaning up the facility after the storm,” says Maria Sadowski, communications specialist at the Sarasota shelter. “Naturally, we need to compensate everyone fairly for their efforts, and are now trying to get this money refunded so it doesn’t have to be taken out of the regular budget for the cats.” The shelter’s total cost for 85.71 overtime hours is $1895.45.

A cat rescued by Humane Society of Highlands County after being outside during Irma.

“We had many kennels crushed by trees on our property,” says Cindy Dutton, volunteer coordinator at the Sebring shelter. “Thankfully, no dogs were killed or injured.” Grant funds will help offset the cost of new kennels, fencing repair and replacement, and tree removal and trimming.

Even before Hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico on Sept. 20, the island was home to thousands of homeless dogs and cats. Since 2015, Randolph, MA-based Paws4Survival has been working to rescue many of those pets, place them in local foster homes for extensive vetting, and transport them to Massachusetts and New York to be adopted.

As one could imagine, the organization’s efforts have been dramatically impacted by Maria, which effectively destroyed the island’s power grid. “We have 50 cats and dogs in Puerto Rico now that are without food and water,” says Paws4Survival President Nicole DiPaolo. “Our foster homes have no electricity or running water and barely any means to care for the animals. All homes with fences have been decimated. We have shipped 1,100 lbs. of supplies via Amerijet this week. Each week we will send another shipping container. Fosters cannot travel to the vet or stores, as gas lines are eight hours long and only cash is accepted.”

Paws4Survival writes on its Facebook page: “Praying for Puerto Rico. This photo came to us from Guaynabo, the town where we found many dogs, like Lorenzo and Valencia. There are no words.”

“Our rescue efforts are at a halt,” DiPaolo says. “There is an embargo on animals flying off the island, so we cannot fly dogs out, resulting in higher boarding expenses. Our foster homes lost fences, so dogs and cats are now in crates and the dogs are unable to go outside unless on leashed walks. Food and water need to be shipped in, with only one airline flying supplies at a commercial rate of $749 per week for 1,100 lbs. of supplies. We are unable to rescue additional animals without added boarding fees, and have no end in sight.

“The dire situation gets worse for our foster families as the days go on. We will use the grant money to rescue dogs that survived Hurricane Maria and place them in boarding, fix our foster homes’ fences so the dogs are not contained in crates but back in yards, and to offset the costs of shipping food and supplies until business resumes in Puerto Rico. Just today, PetSmart opened for one hour and then closed to the public. Costco was open for five hours, but dog food ran out.”

“Hurricane Irma negatively affected our facility in several ways,” says Grant Writer Grace Alfiero. “Because our region lost power for over six days, our refrigerators that stored all the pet medications, including vaccines, were not operable and now we need to replace all the medications and foster supplies. Our facility also suffered some structural damage and we will need to hire a professional contractor to make repairs in our cat isolation room, and with our aluminum overhangs and gutters.

“Specifically, here are our biggest needs, all are immediate needs:
1. Replace the roof damage in our Cat Isolation area so that we can continue to provide quality rehabilitative medical care and save lives.
2. Replace and purchase critical medical supplies, vaccines and prescription food lost during the power outage
3. Fund important landscaping work and trim trees to prevent future damage.
4. Repair aluminum overhangs, gutters and siding blown away during Irma’s high winds.
5. Replace items used to supply our 200+ emergency foster homes caring for the animals during and after the storm (crates, food, kitty litter, blankets and more).

“We project that all repairs will be made as soon as possible and hopefully before November 1, 2017, so that business operations can go back to normal.”

Lisa Pearce, Grants Administrator, says: “Our goal is to save as many animals as possible in the Hurricane Irma aftermath. Our objective is to create a ‘rescue corridor’ up the East Coast and fast track animals as quickly as possible through multiple placement partners. Prior to Hurricane Irma reaching landfall, we rescued 111 dogs and cats from at-risk shelters and evacuated 159 animals out of harm’s way. Crates are in high demand.”

Halifax Humane Society resident Prince, who was in a foster home during Irma, has been adopted!

“Following Irma, our beautiful campus, which is home to about 70 companion dogs of all breeds and sizes, was terribly damaged,” says Stephanie Hochberger, who is on the board of the Davie, FL, organization. “Almost every tree on our 3.5-acre campus was uprooted and smashed much of our fencing. Parts of our roof are leaking badly from the water and wind. We are so grateful none of our dogs were injured as a result of the storm — they were never left alone for a second during Irma.”

Although the group prepared as best it could before the storm by putting up shutters and cutting back the trees, the trees were completely knocked over, and large equipment will be required to help clear the root systems of these decades-old trees. The fences, which provide safety from the main road and allow the dogs to be let outside in cycles, need to be replaced. And the shelter’s roof needs to be replaced or repaired before any more rain arrives.

“Our animals in St. Johns County are in foster homes,” says Joan Guglielmo, director of operations at the St. Augustine, FL, sanctuary. “Because of Hurricane Irma, we are getting daily calls from pet owners who have been made homeless by the storm. Many of the people are unable to take their pets with them to temporary lodging. Ayla’s Acres would like to be able to provide boarding assistance for their pets in order to keep their dogs and cats from being permanently surrendered. The majority of people and their pets need short-term assistance.”

Guglielmo says the average cost to stay at a boarding facility is $30 per animal per day with a rescue-group discount, so our $1,000 grant will allow Ayla’s Acres to provide more than a month of boarding days. Guglielmo anticipates the average stay will be seven days. “We constantly work toward adding more foster families,” she says, “but the need for assistance for temporary boarding is paramount.”

The Batson, Texas, rescue group “sustained damage both inside our facility and out from Hurricane Harvey,” says Executive Director Jacquelynn Jackson. “We received almost 4′ of torrential rainfall, which caused major leaks in the roof of the building our dogs are housed in, resulting in partial ceiling collapse and water damage to floors, bottoms of walls, dog food and crates. We now have mold and mildew growing. We need to immediately purchase a portable building large enough to safely house our dogs until the damaged building can be repaired and sanitized.” Once the repairs are finished and the dogs are transferred back to the original building, the new structure will be used as quarantine housing for dogs displaced by the hurricane.

The other issue needing immediate attention is play yard fencing. “While our building was on higher ground and was not directly affected by actual rising flood water, our kennel and play yard area was,” Jackson says. “We lost over 100′ of fence to rushing flood water. Currently, our dogs do not have a secure place to play while outside together until we are able to repair and replace the fencing.”

Grant funds will be put toward the purchase of a portable building, fence replacement and repair, and dog bedding replacement, and will impact the 25 currently living at the facility and an additional 20 that the shelter will take in after repairs are made and the new space becomes available.

The Pflugerville, Texas-based rescue group requested funds “to help with the medical costs associated with the 15 dogs that we took in from Robstown Animal Shelter and Neuces County Animal Shelter who were impacted by Hurricane Harvey,” says Treasurer Donna Hopsoon. “Of the 15 dogs that we brought into our rescue, four were found to be heartworm-positive and two tested positive for parvo.”

Jennifer Heard, board secretary at the Aransas Pass, Texas, shelter, tells us: “Our animal shelter, the Sandra Sue Benson Animal Adoption Center, has weathered through Hurricane Harvey in fairly good shape. [Board member] Dona Farrar and her husband, Steve, and their family members kept our animals safe and sound while the storm raged outside. The animals were all brought inside and kenneled safely away from the storm. In the aftermath, a generator was provided to maintain occasional air conditioning and a microwave. This family is truly the heart, soul, and backbone of our center.

“Throughout the week following the storm, the Farrars placed all of the animals from our center into the capable hands of other rescue groups that were not in the path of this destructive storm. Thanks to the Gulf Coast Humane Society, the Humane Society of San Antonio, the Wayward Whiskers of San Antonio, the Cowboy Cat Ranch, a farmer in George West wanting barn kitties, and one of our members, Cigden Zambrano, for fostering our two office kitties. So you see, what they say is true: ‘It takes a village.’

“We have been without power since the hurricane struck on Aug. 25.

“We need to take in pets from the community. People are dumping cats and dogs at our shelter. The most immediate need is for medical assistance. Animals need shots, flea prevention and heartworm prevention. Our first priority is to pets back with their owners. Our second priority is for community intake for animals who are lost and to treat them upon intake.

“Our fences are down. We have an 8-foot-high cyclone fence with barbed wire top that is four acres in perimeter and is down in multiple places. We need to put the fence back up.

“We are canceling the birthday bash and the Denim and Diamonds Casino Night. Since locals are financially stressed at this time, we ask that they take care of themselves first. Most of our needs can be taken care of by volunteer man hours and hard work, but our entire budget for a year comes from Casino Night. By canceling this event, we are putting our organization in financial jeopardy.”